On the Tuesday 12th December 2017, Mr Linscott accompanied the three of us to the Institute of Mechanical Engineering in Westminster, London.

We set of from North London Collegiate at 5pm and took the Jubilee line to Westminster station. When we got there, we were amazed by the sight before us. There were so many people inside and the building looked beautiful. Inside, it had intricately carved wood paneling and a very elaborate staircase.

During the evening, we had the opportunity to partake in a range of activities including: building and racing models of the 1000 mph Bloodhound World Land Speed record car and a model of a Rolls Royce jet engine, designing a robot hand and talking to engineers. We were also able to debate cutting-edge research ideas with engineers from Imperial College and Kingston University, explore aerodynamics in a special wind tunnel with model aeroplanes and drones and chat to RAF Cadets.

Two lectures took place throughout the evening; one on aerospace engineering and the other on robotics engineering from Imperial College, which we really enjoyed.

In addition, we won a competition of who could create the fastest and most efficient model of a car using certain materials in order to travel the furthest after being launched using pressurised gas. Our design theory was that we should create the car with the most streamline, least amount of mass, reinforced foundations, strong bonding and eventually a triangle shape. When we won, we were very surprised as we were not sure our design theory would pay off, but it did, and we were awarded our certificates and a kit to build our own Bloodhound World Land Speed record car.

Overall, the evening was very interesting and we feel like we gained more of an insight into the world of engineering and especially mechanical engineering. We would definitely recommend it to anyone interested in engineering, not just mechanical engineering, and maths.